Recipient of Bharat Ratna and the fourth Prime Minister of India, Morarji Ranchhodji Desai was born on 29 Feb 1896 at Bhadeli village near Bulsar in Gujarat. Morarji Desai, an Indian independence activist and also the first Prime Minister to head India’s first non-Congress Government, had served as the Chief Minister of Bombay Province. He gained global fame for his peace activism and made continuous efforts to initiate peace between two rival South Asian states: India and Pakistan. It was after India’s first nuclear explosion in the year 1974 that Desai played a vital role in restoring the friendly relations with China and Pakistan. He vowed to avoid armed conflict like the Indo-Pakistan war of 1971.
Morarji Desai was the only Indian national to be conferred with Pakistan’s highest civilian award, Nishan-e-Pakistan, which was given to him by President Ghulam Ishaq Khan in 1990 during a ceremony. He was a Gandhian follower, institution builder and a social worker. He lived a simple life and used to visit and stay at Vidyapith during his term as the Prime Minister of India. In 1978, Morarji Desai, a long time practitioner of “urine therapy” gave a 60-minute speech regarding the benefits of drinking urine. He later died on 10 April 1995.
